My Beautiful Rescue
by softlyshining
Summary: Edward Cullen is a soldier in training. When he goes to Oklahoma for Basic Training, he finds friends, and come graduation, something he hadn't dreamed possible for boot camp. AH AU Canon pairings.
1. Preface

**So, yeah. This story is dedicated to my brother, who is now officially a soldier in the National Guard. :**

**Disclaimer: Don't own Twilight, or any branch of the military. I do, however, own all four books and a dogtag with my name engraved on it. :D**

**Thanks so much to my beta, AlysonMay. Seriously, without her, this story would be like a two year old with fingerpaints. A mess.**

--

They say that in the Army

The girls are mighty fine

You ask for Betty Grable

They give you Frankenstein

Oh, I don't want no more of Army life

Gee mom, I wanna go home

The biscuits in the Army

They say are mighty fine

One rolled off the table

And killed a pal of mine

Oh, I don't want no more of Army life

Gee mom, I wanna go home

They say that in the Army

The coffee's mighty fine

It looks like muddy water

And tastes like turpentine

Oh, I don't want no more of Army life

Gee mom, I wanna go home

The say that in the Army

The pay is mighty fine

They give you fifty dollars

And take back forty-nine

Oh, I don't want no more of Army life

Gee mom, I wanna go home

A chaplain in the Army

Has a collar on his neck

If you don't listen to him

You'll all wind up in heck

Oh, I don't want no more of Army life

Gee mom, I wanna go home

Oh the surgeons in the Army

They say we're mighty bright

We work on soldiers through the day

And nurses through the night

Oh, I don't want no more of Army life

Gee mom, I wanna go home

The corporals in the Army

You say we're really green

But if it weren't for us guys

You'd be in the latrine

Oh, I don't want no more of Army life

Gee mom, I wanna go home

Oh some guys like the Army

I think that it's a mess

If it's so damn terrific

How come I wear a dress

Oh, I don't want no more of Army life

Gee mom, I wanna go home

Friendships in the Army

They say are mighty rare

So I spend all my free time

Carousing with my mare

Oh, I don't want no more of Army life

Gee mom, I wanna go home

The girls at the service club

They say are mighty fine

Most are over eighty

And the rest are under nine

Gee, mom, I wanna go

But they won't let me go home

Gee, mom, I wanna go home

--_Gee Mom, I Wanna Go Home_, a marching song.


	2. New Arrivals

**I have nothing against Oklahoma, or hicks, btw. This was my brother's opinion on the south, though, lol.**

--

**EPOV**

Pulling out my iPod earphones for what I knew would be the last time for at least ten weeks, I stepped off the filthy government bus that had led me to the place I'd been losing sleep over for weeks. Months even.

This was what my mother had demanded I do with my life. And if she hadn't been on her death bed when she'd said that, God knows I wouldn't be here right now, looking at nothing but the flat nothing that was Oklahoma. Blue, unclouded skies, hicks, and knock off stores as far as the eye could see.

I looked around and saw that a good sixty or so men were already here. _Guess my bus was late_, I thought.

"Yo Cullen!" a deep voice bellowed. I turned around to find a huge, muscular figure towering above me. His size was quite intimidating, and quite frankly I'd thought he'd be the battery's own bully.

"Yes...?" It's a very strange, unsettling feeling to walk into an unknown place and have some random stranger just yell out your name. Especially since we hadn't even received our name tags.

He smiled a huge grin, literally ear to ear, and stuck his hand out. "Hey man, I'm McCarty. Nice to finally meet you, Cullen."

I'm sure confusion was written all over my face as I shook his hand.

He laughed and pointed to one of the men in the higher ranking uniforms. He had hair so gray that it was almost white, and was tall, almost lanky. "Dude, see that douche right there?"

I nodded. "He's a drill sergeant." Drill Sergeant Volturi wasn't one of the people I was going to be messing with. My brother James had quite a few horror stories of his own experiences here, most of them centered around him doing something idiotic and Drill Sergeant Volturi forcing him to do pushups or crunches or something. Oo, scary. But for someone as naive and unprepared as James, who always managed to find shortcuts in gym so that he wouldn't have to run a mile or do any exercise whatsoever, I suppose it was absolutely, crap-your-pants-on-contact terrifying.

McCarty lowered his voice; something I'd thought to be impossible. "No shit, he's a drill sergeant. His name is fucking Volturi. Keeps calling me Cullen. Asshole. He obviously can't read."

I laughed. "Just keep your mouth shut when you're near him. One of his favorite things to do is piss people like you off." In every single one of James' letters, he'd explain, in gruesome detail, the horrors of his personal piece of hell, basic training. I'd known for a fact that if my idiot brother had just kept his mouth shut, then he wouldn't have to run extra laps and do so many extra pushups.

"Nah. The worst thing they can do is fail me and send me to fat camp. I wouldn't mind the extra exercise." He laughed, and about twenty of the other newcomers turned to stare, questions written in their eyes. McCarty seemed used to people's reaction to his all around...loudness. I mean, it's sort of hard to dodge all those stares. "So, kid, where are you from?"

"Chicago."

"The windy city?" he asked, and I nodded. "Nice. I'm from New York."

I didn't need his answer to know he was from New York. His accent was a dead giveaway.

"Do you know anyone here yet?" I asked in a weak attempt to keep the conversation flowing.

"Sure do, my friend. I know, he seems like the type to run off dancing and skipping through a field of rainbows and unicorns, but I promise, he's cool," McCarty had a way with words. I had to fight the sudden urge to ask why he wasn't a poet. "Hey, Whitlock!" he called, and a tall, pale man, looking no older than his mid-twenties turned in our direction, putting his conversation with one of the Drill Sergeants on hold. He had blonde hair that was even longer and shaggier than mine, "C'mere, man."

Whitlock jogged over to where we stood. He outstretched his hand towards me, and spoke, in a heavy southern drawl, "Nice to meet you."

"Cullen, meet my good ol' pal Whitlock," McCarty said, pulling Whitlock into a headlock and ruffling his hair. "He knows his way down south, if you know what I mean."

"Shut up, Emmett...er...McCarty." Whitlock laughed.

"You guys know each other outside of this rut?" I asked.

"Sure do," Whitlock said, smiling a little and rolling his eyes. "'Monster McCarty' here's dating my sister."

"And she is fine," McCarty added, his eyes glazing over. "She does this thing with her tongue, where..."

"Alright, alright! I don't want to hear what my sister does with her tongue." Whitlock scrunched up his face in disgust.

I felt a twinge of jealousy. Sure, I'd had relationships with girls. They weren't lasting, though, and weren't anything memorable. With a sigh, a shook off those thoughts.

"Whitlock! McCarty! Cullen!" Drill Sergeant Aro Volturi called. "Fuckin' push! We called you over here two minutes ago!"

And with a groan, we dropped onto the dirt.


	3. He's Not Supposed to Be Here

**m'kay. once again, we thank my wonderful beta AlysonMay. my stories will forever bow down to hers.**

--

"I'm not even supposed to be here," Newton, a whiny little eighteen year old from Boston with a stutter said. Again.

"Damn, Newt-Balls, didn't Mommy teach you how to say anything else?" McCarty groaned. He had taken to giving everyone a nickname, usually a vulgar or crude one at that. "Man, every day in that high, shrilly little fag voice," McCarty forced his baritone voice up to sloppily hit soprano notes, at this point, "'I-I-I'm not supposed to be here!'"

"Give the kid a break," Whitlock said, putting his pen down and, out of habit, running a hand through where his blonde locks once were, then realizing, once again, that he was bald, like the rest of us.

"O, Wittle Whitlock, how your words amuse me."

"Wittle?" Whitlock questioned. "What the fuck is 'wittle'?"

"You're 'wittle'."

After a few long moments, Whitlock grimaced. "Oh, dear McCarty," he said, feigning sincerity, "The only thing that is 'wittle' here is your brain."

"And your pe..."

"McCarty!"

"What? I was going to say pen! It's, like, half the size of my hand."

Whitlock tossed his pen at him, and McCarty caught it between his teeth.

"Impressive," I muttered, half smiling.

"Years of practice," he said. "This mouth can do a lot more than just catch things, you know."

"Yeah," I said, grinning, "it can curse like a sailor."

Drill Sergeant Schmikhail, a small little fellow who was probably teased so much about his size that he joined the army for power, marched into the room. "All right, you pieces of shit," he grumbled. He never really was in a good mood at five o'clock in the morning. "You've got some letters."

Sounds of approval rang throughout the congregation.

"So, when I call your name, pri'ates, I want y'all to drop and gimme fifty. Not forty nine, not fifty one. Fifty. Are we clear?" he drawled.

"Yes, Drill Sergeant!" we said in unison.

"Yeah, shut up." he grumbled, then started reading off names. Smith, Gomez, Crowley, Chaney, Newton, and Dix were first.

McCarty could hardly contain himself when Schmikhail called on Private Dix. He was literally ripping at the seams; a grin breaking out on his face.

"McCarty!" Schmikhail called, as McCarty sobered up.

"Er, yes, Drill Sergeant?" he stuttered.

"Package. That's seventy five pushups. Ya hear?"

"Yes."

"Yes, what, McCarty?"

"Yes, Drill Sergeant!" he bellowed.

Seventy five pushups later, he received the package. Whitlock and I watched as his eyes widened.

"McCarty, I swear, if that's the birthday card my sister promised..." Whitlock threatened.

"I wish," McCarty smirked. "But, no, it's from Bella."

Bella? Was this Whitlock's sister? It certainly was a pretty name, and I wondered if her face fit it's Italian translation. Beautiful. McCarty was probably a lucky guy.

Whitlock noticed the look of confusion on my face.

"Bella is McCarty's little stepsister," he explained. "So, man, what's in the  
package?"

"Pictures." McCarty smiled.

"Care to share?" I cocked my eyebrow. He tossed over the packet, and I pulled  
out a single photograph. A fair girl with cascading brown curls smiled shyly back at me.

Something about the innocence projected just in her smile was so… so sexy.

Damn, beautiful didn't even do the girl justice. And this was only a picture.

I sifted through more of McCarty's pictures, smiling every so often. He was certainly a lucky guy. I'd grown up thinking that siblings were just God-given torturers. McCarty was different, though. Judging by the photographs, the two of them looked like they meant the world to each other.

James was never like that with me. He was the kind of older brother who would push me in the dirt and repeatedly try to break the closest limb to his hideous old pair of Vans.

"Shit," Newton swore, bringing me back from Memory Lane.

"What is it now, Newton?" I hissed. "Did Mommy forget to sign with x's and o's again?"

McCarty and Whitlock stared back at me, shock written on their face.

"What?" I asked.

"I had no idea the ever so sullen Cullen had it in him." McCarty muttered.

"I can't believe this," Newton whined.

"Dude, seriously, what's your problem now?" McCarty laughed.

"I'm really not supposed to be here," Newton's jaw dropped. "I just got another letter from Knox asking me where the fuck I am."

--

**there ya have it. chapter two.  
hate it? love it? review?:3**


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